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Partisanship in Transition: The Case of the Russian Federation 1995-2004
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between 2000 and 2004 might be attributed to negative campaigns directed at them during the 2003 parliamentary campaign (particularly given that all major television networks in Russia were state-controlled and attacked the Communist Party mercilessly) and the fact that these parties then failed to nominate their strongest candidates for the 2004 presidential elections.
10
The rise of the party of power can thus be seen as the result of biased media coverage and other advantages of incumbency. This, then, implies an element of “supply side” instability driven by incumbent authorities’ actions. It is also important to note, however, that Russia’s economy, by most accounts, reached the bottom of its long collapse in 1998 and began growing considerably in 1999, growth that has continued through 2004. Other survey work shows that far more people in Russia believe the economy is improving than think it is worsening (Hale, McFaul, and Colton 2004). Thus, the finding that attachments to the party of power have surged among our panel survivors after 1999 and that opposition parties, almost across the board, went into steep decline, is also consistent with the notion that the economic performance of incumbent authorities is driving dynamics in transitional partisanship. This rise in party-of-power popularity is also consistent with the interpretation that professions of loyalty to Unity and then United Russia might reflect a rather contingent affection for Putin, an extremely popular figure who has unambiguously supported both Unity and United Russia (without becoming a member himself). This personality-based attachment may well be independent of actual assessments of Putin’s performance on the economy or other issues. Surely, the three interpretations are not mutually exclusive, and one helps explain the success of the other, although we would benefit from attempting to sort them out more decisively.
11
Another way to break down the trends in aggregate partisanship over time is to consider
“families” of parties, sets of parties that share a certain ideational vision. Here we adopt a relatively non-controversial categorization of Russian parties, following Colton and Hough (1998) and Colton (2000), illustrated in Table 3. This reveals patterns quite similar to those just described, with pro-government parties soaring with the 2000 and 2004 survey waves and the socialists and liberals dropping off considerably (the centrists having dropped to near-negligible levels by 1996). Nationalist parties, on the other hand, started strong in 1995, then dropped dramatically for 1996 and 2000, only to experience a renewed but modest rise in 2004. Another slight difference when one considers families instead of individual parties is that loyalty to socialist parties does not appear to grow prior to 2004; instead there is a good deal of stability.
12
Overall, then, while aggregate levels of partisanship do not appear to have increased steadily between 1995 and 2004, a pronounced shift does appear to be taking place among those parties that have registered significant degrees of partisanship. This shift has been from opposition parties to incumbent-associated organizations.
10
Yabloko boycotted what it considered to be an unfair contest; SPS was split over whether to back Putin; and the
KPRF nominated a token candidate who was little known, also in protest against what it characterized as a playing field tilted toward the incumbents.
11
Indeed, it is important to recognize that Yabloko and SPS actually received fairly favorable coverage on state-run
television during the 2003 campaign, with Yabloko’s leader even publicly appearing in a favorable light together with President Putin in the final days of the campaign. Their coverage, of course, was in far lesser volume than was that devoted to United Russia and, perhaps more importantly, these two parties devoted substantial resources to attacking each other in what turned out to be a hugely self-destructive struggle for preeminence in the liberal, pro-reform camp in Russian politics.
12
Of course, the growth reported in Table 2 is also of a low level and likely falls within a reasonable margin of
error.
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| | Authors: Hale, Henry. and Colton, Timothy. |
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9
between 2000 and 2004 might be attributed to negative campaigns directed at them during the
2003 parliamentary campaign (particularly given that all major television networks in Russia
were state-controlled and attacked the Communist Party mercilessly) and the fact that these
parties then failed to nominate their strongest candidates for the 2004 presidential elections.
10
The rise of the party of power can thus be seen as the result of biased media coverage and other
advantages of incumbency. This, then, implies an element of “supply side” instability driven by
incumbent authorities’ actions. It is also important to note, however, that Russia’s economy, by
most accounts, reached the bottom of its long collapse in 1998 and began growing considerably
in 1999, growth that has continued through 2004. Other survey work shows that far more people
in Russia believe the economy is improving than think it is worsening (Hale, McFaul, and Colton
2004). Thus, the finding that attachments to the party of power have surged among our panel
survivors after 1999 and that opposition parties, almost across the board, went into steep decline,
is also consistent with the notion that the economic performance of incumbent authorities is
driving dynamics in transitional partisanship. This rise in party-of-power popularity is also
consistent with the interpretation that professions of loyalty to Unity and then United Russia
might reflect a rather contingent affection for Putin, an extremely popular figure who has
unambiguously supported both Unity and United Russia (without becoming a member himself).
This personality-based attachment may well be independent of actual assessments of Putin’s
performance on the economy or other issues. Surely, the three interpretations are not mutually
exclusive, and one helps explain the success of the other, although we would benefit from
attempting to sort them out more decisively.
11
Another way to break down the trends in aggregate partisanship over time is to consider
“families” of parties, sets of parties that share a certain ideational vision. Here we adopt a
relatively non-controversial categorization of Russian parties, following Colton and Hough
(1998) and Colton (2000), illustrated in Table 3. This reveals patterns quite similar to those just
described, with pro-government parties soaring with the 2000 and 2004 survey waves and the
socialists and liberals dropping off considerably (the centrists having dropped to near-negligible
levels by 1996). Nationalist parties, on the other hand, started strong in 1995, then dropped
dramatically for 1996 and 2000, only to experience a renewed but modest rise in 2004. Another
slight difference when one considers families instead of individual parties is that loyalty to
socialist parties does not appear to grow prior to 2004; instead there is a good deal of stability.
12
Overall, then, while aggregate levels of partisanship do not appear to have increased steadily
between 1995 and 2004, a pronounced shift does appear to be taking place among those parties
that have registered significant degrees of partisanship. This shift has been from opposition
parties to incumbent-associated organizations.
10
Yabloko boycotted what it considered to be an unfair contest; SPS was split over whether to back Putin; and the
KPRF nominated a token candidate who was little known, also in protest against what it characterized as a playing
field tilted toward the incumbents.
11
Indeed, it is important to recognize that Yabloko and SPS actually received fairly favorable coverage on state-run
television during the 2003 campaign, with Yabloko’s leader even publicly appearing in a favorable light together
with President Putin in the final days of the campaign. Their coverage, of course, was in far lesser volume than was
that devoted to United Russia and, perhaps more importantly, these two parties devoted substantial resources to
attacking each other in what turned out to be a hugely self-destructive struggle for preeminence in the liberal, pro-
reform camp in Russian politics.
12
Of course, the growth reported in Table 2 is also of a low level and likely falls within a reasonable margin of
error.
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